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[May 27th, 2015] Commander Slot and Equipment

Greetings and welcome to another edition of Developer’s Digest. If you’re just joining us for the first time, this is an ongoing Wednesday only post that provides insight and answers from the Dawn Development team (mostly from me, Mouse) into community concerns and questions.

Commander Slot and Equipment
The Commander Slot and equipment was introduced quite a long time ago as a way to help spice up and improve the diversity and power of legions. While this has been accomplished to a point, it has only been somewhat recently that we started seeing procs and synergy effects specifically designed around the Commander slot.

For the Commander slot specifically we’ve talked about adding different procs and effects that only function for a General within that slot, this works well but we need to be mindful that we don’t do this too much since you only have a single Commander slot, so the procs need to either be highly specialized for a specific situation or just fairly rare. The other disadvantage is that if a General is focused on having synergy with the Commander slot but you use someone else instead, that General is suddenly far less effective and more of their mechanics go to waste.

For equipment, we don’t feel as though we’ve done a great job of making Commander equipment feel special in the slightest; there’s no unique proc or ability that helps these sets stand out. We’ve been considering adding either a very specific Commander equipment proc to some item sets, or giving a “dual” proc of sorts so one functions a certain way when worn by the player and then has a different proc while worn by the Commander.

Conclusion
We haven’t “pulled the trigger” on these yet because we want to make sure they feel different, fun and engaging, we don’t want to add a proc for the sake of adding a proc as it were. But it is our goal to continue to diversify and improve the way you benefit from your Commanders and their equipment.

Is there a specific proc or approach you’d like to see us take in regards to the Commander and their equipment? Let us know in a response to this post!

Until next time, adventurers.

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This could be interesting but a pain to implement. If this is released then chances are that every player will have the new commander gear as their commander gear for a while. So that might kill variety. A solution could be to release many set or retcon some current sets, like maybe mathalas can have a boost on commander and a few other sets as well.

As far as approach goes. It's really hard to read the ever growing procs, and now with a "commander only" set in play, it'd be even bigger/have to go to the wiki to see it. Sooo, my suggestion, When equipped in the commander slot, the "proc" description changes to the commander one, outside it - regular. Or alternatively, when in legion items, it only shows the commander gear/commander type procs (or whatever the proc will be) and the main inventory shows player/player only bonuses. Option 3: altho less fun.. Instead of hover descriptions, may have to go to click, opens a page, "equip - yes/no, The bonds of the international spy - equip for coolness+20 on comma..."
If it's commander only, will it be commander specific (for example, Mardu has the firelord gear) armor that ties in with said commander/procs for him only, or be general commander gear. Think getting epic gear for a paladn, compared to gear that works on warriors, monks..paladins..death knights etc.

Personally i think it's a fun mechanic what grundus has. Where it changes form, why not have something like that. With the right equipment, (for example) and the "synergy" A paideia gets equipped over your main character's weapon (altho the other stuff still applies, this is purely an easter egg). Or, like kyrose/kyrose 2. Instead of crafting a solid general. The image of the commander changes (only with set gear) to show an equipped/armored version to show the commander proc is on/working. Or...with illusion gear.. Extra forms, v'rakul (can't spell it) the spirit binder -> werewolf illusion, get's more in touch and get's a boost to spirit wolves. Becomes more furry/wolf then orc in the pic.
Anyhew my want of forms/summons aside (they always make games fun)...
I'd guess one of the main tweaks would be armor that gives brigade type boosts. "when equipped, with kolemaru in the commander slot, gain 3 percent brigade bonus on each orc in the legion" Thats small and random, but a general idea.

Rambling.. But anyway, it seems like a great idea ^.^ altho after reading the recent state of the game..if talent's are implemented. What about commander specific talents/boosts applied with commander super gear?

Something that has been asked about before is having the stats of commander equipment matter. Given that it would be the commander wearing it, using the 2*att + 0.4*def formula on those stats would likely be a logical approach. However, given that those stats would also be multiplied by legion power bonus, it would still add a significant amount to legion damage, which may be problematic.

A possible addition would be to have special "Set bonuses" for legions. So possibly having the commander equipped with a full set of gear would give them a bonus. You could group sets into tiers, so easy to get sets like Gold or Salamander Hide might add a small bonus, like 10% to Commander's stats. Hard to get sets like Invincible Callissa would add a correspondingly higher bonus. That might require going back and modifying each individual set though, but would potentially make older sets a bit more useful, especially for newer players.

How about adding 2-3 commander slots with +/or - 25% BONUS TO GENERAL'S stats
and in the future maybe grow legions around that

like if machon is commander he loses a small % of powr for " - " or for a new powerfully premium he would gain % in case of dmg +

also ideea for a premium adds one commander slot to any legion he is in and occupy s that slot -proc ideea - something like watching from afar
Premium troop - joins any existing legion by adding himself in a newly created slot (if a unique commander slot and troop slot are owned then adds 25% legion dmg)

I prefer the LoTS approach in this aspect of the game. AI /mods/ weapons just seems to fit better than simply using another set of gear and a spare general slot:

Commander Slot

Right now, it's simply an any/any/any slot for a general. In a legion that is heavy on racial restrictions, I can fit one more general I otherwise would not be able to. If the choice came down as to fit a premium general in the commander slot or another free/pc general with commander bonuses in the slot, the premium would win out. With pc legions that's not a common problem, but the competition will always be between whatever the stats are on the commander-boost general and the next most powerful general I could fit in instead. So there's a higher standard acting on commander specific generals.

As for what it should be... I would edge towards design that is very powerful, limited in utility, and follows a typical NiP lifespan. Having a commander-boost officer in the octopod/apex predator type packs would work well as a high tier item.

Interesting commander boosts could look like: empowers the effects of certain magics when they're equipped to a raid, amplifies/alters the procs on gear equipped to a legion, negates the effect of certain campaign modifies (curse/chilling), grants a chance at additional unique loot against certain raids on looting, etc.
Legion Gear Sets:

Legion gear allows me to have two sets of active equipment instead of one; which is good for extracting more value from gear in terms of duplicates and older sets. I see no issue with adding equipment that has dual functionality depending on where it is equipped, but consider it a minor plus since gear works just fine without this functionality.

Yeah, let's try not to move to the LoTS version. I do not mind what we have now, but I would be careful making commander sets have procs that are too useful. What is the point in buying a second set of some specialized set if the commander set will be it in the legion? Now for generalized use, there may be a few hiccups, but I could see it working.

Beware the Jabberwock, my son! The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!

Something that has been asked about before is having the stats of commander equipment matter. Given that it would be the commander wearing it, using the 2*att + 0.4*def formula on those stats would likely be a logical approach. However, given that those stats would also be multiplied by legion power bonus, it would still add a significant amount to legion damage, which may be problematic.

A possible addition would be to have special "Set bonuses" for legions. So possibly having the commander equipped with a full set of gear would give them a bonus. You could group sets into tiers, so easy to get sets like Gold or Salamander Hide might add a small bonus, like 10% to Commander's stats. Hard to get sets like Invincible Callissa would add a correspondingly higher bonus. That might require going back and modifying each individual set though, but would potentially make older sets a bit more useful, especially for newer players.

Im not a fan of stats counting on commander gear for the sole reason that currently its the only thing stopping best gear on self = best gear on legion. And i like that variety that there are some sets that are amazing on legion and some amazing on self.

How about just adding a proc to slots and not the equipment?
3 pieces procs this much
5 pieces procs this much
so on and so forth
That way it would work with any set.
You could also specialize the proc according to the commanders attribute.

Diversifying ideas usually sound interesting, but from a practical point of view there's a often a limit at which it changes from interesting to annoying. That limit is very subjective of course and also depends a lot on usefulness and usability. Too much diversification of one part of the game (e.g. types and purposes of gear) automatically decreases the usefulness of every single instance of it. And usabilty usually decreases with it (more things to choose from makes it harder to find the right things). Eventually the usefulness is overshadowed by usability issues, and the whole system becomes stress instead of fun.

Personally I feel the game is already over that limit in various parts, and one of those regards gear. My interest in diversifying gear is already saturated, there are already more types around than I am able to honestly care about. A part of it is that I generally feel we have too much stuff and new stuff coming in too fast, it's difficult to even keep track of that all. Especially all the gear with very narrow and cross-type use annoys me a little (like Veil-Walker for just Z16 raids, or Faetouched for just 2 guild raids, or Ancient Hero for just 1 guild raid). The usefulness is only a minor factor for me though, and as someone who likes optimizing stuff I would use the very special gear anyway....well....if it weren't for the big usability issues.

When I don't have a legion for that specific purpose of some gear, then I don't care because manually switching legion gear is a major PITA. As long as we can't save differently equipped versions of the same legion, many well-intended diversifying efforts (mainly for gear) might be wasted. (Unfortunately the legion system just got an overhaul last year without addressing that, so I don't expect anything major improvements any time soon.)

This affects not only those narrow-purpose gear. Most specialized legions still have too high base power and too low special power, so frequently an older specialized legion is suddenly outclassed by a new legion with a completely different special. And this also makes the special gear used on the old legion obsloete as legion gear.

For Avatar gear the situation is somewhat better, but I would have to buy 20 extra slots to cover all special cross-cases for which I theoretically have a different setup. I usually only switch manually when I am in the mood for it, and if the gear is either still visible in the "newest" sort or if it's easy to find with the search function.

Gear naming can also affect the motivation threshold for searching it: Sometimes gear sets have non-standard names (for example half the Bonds of Azure gear is called "azure something" and the other half "bonded something"). And some different-purpose gear sets have too similar names (for example there is Advanced Clockwork stuff for Giants and some for Contructs).

Commander gear:

I kinda see two possible scenarios (switching over time depending on gear releases):

We have special commander gear that is just so awesome that it beats practically every other gear and is equipped almost on all legions. While this would eliminate problems of "changing commander gear is too annoying to consider using special purpose gear", it would do that by eliminating the usefulness of other special purpose gear. That doesn't seem like a win.

Commander set gear is comparable to other gear. Then it just another way of diversifying a part of the game that is already too diverse in my opinion (see above). Nothing special about it except that it just adds a new kind of restriction to usefulness of gear.

Commander slot:

I was never sure why we have a commander slot anyway, especially after it became an Any/Any slot regardless of other general restrictions. But I am not sure I want to make it extra special now. In the end all I (and most other players) care about is to make a legion as good as possible, adding another type of effect will increase the potentially good legion assignments we have to try and compare. And with all the different synergies we have, I already reached the limit where this is fun, especially with the high rate at which we get new legions/gens/troops. Even now I spend too much time (more than is fun for me) optimizing my legions every time I get new, potentially good stuff. I think a year ago I would have liked to add more commander based synergies, but now I am simply fed up with what we have.

Sorry for sounding so negative, but I generally think that DotD is overgrown already and is overdoing it with new content and diversity of new features. That was intriguing for a while, but by now the game lacks proper usability for that amount of stuff, and I think it should start to embrace a "keep it simple" approach.

For equipment, we don’t feel as though we’ve done a great job of making Commander equipment feel special in the slightest
Is there a specific proc or approach you’d like to see us take in regards to the Commander and their equipment? Let us know in a response to this post!

That's because the equipment for the commander has never worked the way it was rolled out. Any equipment put in the commander slot gives procs that it's designed to do whether worn on the toon or in the commander's slot. What has never happened is that it doesn't give any of it's boosts, passive or otherwise which is what it was supposed to do from the get go.

My suggestion would be to just fix the original design so the gear in the commander's slot works the very same way it does when worn on your toon. It's the whole purpose for trying to get 2 full sets or at least it was when it was first introduced.
Fixing that error in coding would save you having to "design" anything new and exciting or worrying about which general we put in there or "wasted mechanics" as you put it.
I only use the commander slot to add a general that will boost legion power anyway but having the second set of equipment work the way it's supposed to would make me a very happy camper.

I much prefer LOTS's engineering system to DOTD's commander equipment system. That's really the only thing I like better about LOTS.

I like the way the Engineering system finally differentiated LotS from DotD too. In fact, it's the only design that made sense for LotS, story/lore-wise. A good call from (hate to mention it, but it's the truth) Dahrizon.

Originally Posted by Artydent

Sorry for sounding so negative, but I generally think that DotD is overgrown already and is overdoing it with new content and diversity of new features. That was intriguing for a while, but by now the game lacks proper usability for that amount of stuff, and I think it should start to embrace a "keep it simple" approach.

Will try to keep this post short. In short -

All this while, I always believed ... I thought we are the commander in the very first place? Logic-wise, the commander slot only made sense in ... Invasions, years after it was implemented. Think about it.

And, truth be told - "fixing" the commander slot is a very bad idea, because while of course it can always be better, it isnt broken. Artydent in fact detailed for you why you would break the system which at least is working now.

Saturation point was reached some time ago, indeed. This is just a thread asking players - what else can we sell you? It sounds negative this way. I am sorry for sounding so negative too, but hey, it's the truth.

While I dont like Apple, in this case, it might be good to follow what they are doing ... "keep it simple" after Dawnni V, indeed.

LotS added in a brand new Engineering feature which ticks all the boxes, and allows 5PG to sell more products. This commander slot direction is a really wrong way of doing it.

- this will require great feat from the devs, but ... allowing players to equip-ing in legion every single troop (type, at least. Melee with swords, Ranged with bows, Healers with staffs, Tanks with shields, Special with ... something special.) Allowing players to equip-ing in legion every general. If you want minimum coding, then just follow the earlier example. To make things slightly special, e.g. Roland can gain bonuses if he is equiped with the orange oroc sword, following the lore through all the way.

Sure, this will only add more power to legions further, but ... I personally stopped caring so much for the power creep after Utym. It's been years that the few of us kept speaking up for the newer players, and I am a bit tired at this point. And while it is correct that not many web games lasted 5 years like 5PG, in truth, this is the reality for 2015.

There are so many (and i mean, so many) web games around, and yet only so many web players on Earth, that most games had to be marketed this year for the foreseeable future. The 50k - 9k = 41k players from the FB server didnt just go up in smoke; most of them simply move on to the next big f2p thingy.

I like the idea but what if the gear equipped added a special bonus to the general in the commander slot) (ie: a legion bonus, doubles proc chance).

Personally, the only reason I would equip a certain gen is if I need their proc effect and can't fit them anywhere else, ie: Gibbo, Macheon, Tollo. Perhaps the legion gear giving some sort of functional bonus such as on-hit drops, increases my chance to get rare loot from a raid, doubles crit chance, etc. There are some idea suggestions that this idea could go well with, especially the changing color for SP crafts suggestion

Im not a fan of stats counting on commander gear for the sole reason that currently its the only things stopping best gear on self = best gear on legion. And i like that variety that there are some sets that are amazing on legion and some amazing on self.

I /don't/ like that variety in a single item, honestly. We've a great deal to compare already, and it just causes information overload. I would very much like it if the legion equipment's stats (Including what Runes add) would be added to and modified by the Special Bonus vs Raid Stats that Turtle already adds to. Let the variety be /between/ items. That being said, the idea of having a general getting a boost from their set being equipped in commander slot sounds interesting.